Chapter 15: Preparation and Risks

No matter what you do, you need to prepare. If there’s something you haven’t prepared for, it’s only because the “preparation” for that thing has already been done in your past life.

The same goes for accepting small missions, and there’s even a lot to prepare for.

The three of them left the Faculty of Law and Letters Building 2 and went to the small woods where Sanshiro Pond was located, talking as they walked.

“Subjugating yokai is a ‘battle’; subjugating human cultivators is a ‘purge.’ People who accept missions to participate in a purge have a unified name—’purgers,’ but they each have their own code names.”

“Code names?” Minamoto Kiyomoto was taken aback for a moment, then he understood.

If you kill a yokai, you kill it. But once you make an enemy of a human, not only will you be constantly remembered by their family and friends, but your own family and friends will also be retaliated against.

But you can change your name and cover your face. What about the color of your divine power?
“Can divine power also be changed?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked them.

“Of course,” Himemiya Izayoi’s tone was light, her voice rising at the end.

“There is a curse called ‘False Form,’ which can change the color of your divine power,” Kamibayashi Miko said, telling Minamoto Kiyomoto the incantation for this curse.

She already knew that Minamoto Kiyomoto had a very good memory, so she only recited it once.

After she finished, she warned him again:

“I told you from the beginning, a curse is both power and restraint. The False Form curse can change the color of your divine power, but if you don’t master it deeply enough, or if you use it for a long time, your divine power will become turbid, your personality will change, and you may even completely become another person.”

“That sounds very dangerous,” Minamoto Kiyomoto said.

“As long as your capacity is sufficient, you don’t have to worry about these things at all,” Himemiya Izayoi said nonchalantly. “Just like a demonic beast that can destroy a city is a disaster for humans, but for the earth itself, it’s just a slightly larger animal.”

Minamoto Kiyomoto nodded in understanding.

He was a complete novice as a cultivator. Although his talent was outstanding, he would humbly accept the guidance of others.

“Let’s try it now,” Kamibayashi Miko stopped and looked at Minamoto Kiyomoto.

Some destructive curses could not be practiced here, but the False Form curse could.

The three of them swelled with divine light—black, gold, and the red of flames—and disappeared from the sight of the students and tourists who were also strolling here at noon.

“Are there any tricks?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked.

“The False Form curse tests whether a person is good at disguise. A person with sufficient capacity and who is good at disguise will learn it as soon as they learn it,” Kamibayashi Miko’s voice was pleasant, as if ice were melting in the spring wind.

“Then that’s a problem,” Minamoto Kiyomoto said as if he had a headache. “There aren’t many honest people in this world, and I’m one of them.”

Himemiya Izayoi laughed out loud, “Hey, are you serious?”

Kamibayashi Miko also looked at him with a strange expression.

“I’ll prove it to you,” Minamoto Kiyomoto was very confident and immediately cast the spell according to the incantation.

In his mind, he imagined the color of the divine power he wanted, and then continuously expanded it.

This imagined divine power gradually filled his entire body, becoming one with him, and gradually he had the feeling that it was about to expand outwards through all the pores of his body.

At this time, he softly recited the incantation of the False Form curse.

“Sometimes far, sometimes near, sometimes sinking, sometimes floating.”

The sea of black light around him slowly turned golden.

The golden divine power had no impurities. It was as if a handful had been scooped from the sea of divine light on Kamibayashi Miko’s body and then poured over him.

“…” Minamoto Kiyomoto looked at his hand and said, “I don’t think this is called disguise. People have multiple sides.”

Kamibayashi Miko looked at him without speaking.

“Could it be that my capacity is too large and my talent is too good, so it doesn’t matter if I’m not good at disguise?” Minamoto Kiyomoto turned his head and asked Himemiya Izayoi.

The sound of Himemiya Izayoi’s silver-bell-like, pleasant, and cheerful laughter rang out by the pond.

“How long did you guys practice the False Form curse?” Minamoto Kiyomoto was not convinced and asked Kamibayashi Miko.

Kamibayashi Miko had one last sentence left of her five sentences in ten minutes. She said, “I want to drink the yogurt from the Faculty of Agriculture.”

“…Wh-what?” Even in his divine power state, Minamoto Kiyomoto still thought he had misheard.

“I want to drink it too, that, the yogurt from the Faculty of Agriculture!” Himemiya Izayoi followed.

Minamoto Kiyomoto glanced at the two of them. They were serious.

Ten minutes later, the three of them by the pond each had a cup of yogurt.

Through the dense shade of the trees above, one could glimpse the blue sky, and the motionless clouds were like pure, flawless marble.

“What code names are you guys going to choose?” Himemiya Izayoi took two sips of yogurt and asked the two of them curiously.

“Sanshiro Pond, I’ll be ‘Rokuro’,” Minamoto Kiyomoto thought for a moment and said.

“Yogurt,” Kamibayashi Miko released the straw from her mouth. After saying this, she put the straw back in her mouth as if it were nothing.

“It sounds good,” this was the first time Minamoto Kiyomoto had praised her against his will.

Kamibayashi Miko nodded, meaning thank you.

This code name didn’t suit her at all. She had an otherworldly temperament, while yogurt sounded like a sweet girl.

However, from the point of view of hiding one’s identity, it was a very good code name.

Anyway, Minamoto Kiyomoto would never have thought that she, as a Divine Miko who was far from the secular world, would use ‘Yogurt’ as a code name.

Himemiya Izayoi looked at the two of them for a while and suddenly laughed cheerfully.

She seemed very happy, her face showing a pure smile, as if she had returned to a time without doubt.

“Mmm—, what should I choose?” she looked left and right, wanting to find a suitable name from the scene, very interested in this matter.

“What kind of tree is this?” Himemiya Izayoi looked up.

“Chinquapin tree,” Minamoto Kiyomoto replied.

“Then should I be called Chinquapin Tree? Or Carp? Or White Cloud? Afternoon? Todai?”

“Let’s forget about Todai.”

“I’m not from Todai. Even if I use Todai as a code name, you won’t be able to find me,” Himemiya Izayoi said, drinking the yogurt from Todai’s Faculty of Agriculture by Todai’s Sanshiro Pond.

“But the name Todai is too, too, too ugly,” her soft lips released the white straw. “I’ll use ‘Beauty’.”

“…”

“Do you have a better one?”

“No.”

“Then why don’t you praise me?” The delicate face that was just laughing a moment ago was now devoid of emotion, looking at Minamoto Kiyomoto coldly.

“You are already a beauty, so it sounds very plain, not as impactful as Yogurt. If you used ‘Hot Dog’ or ‘Bread,’ I would definitely say ‘it sounds good’.”

Kamibayashi Miko’s gaze shifted from the pond and shot towards Minamoto Kiyomoto.

“Don’t kick, don’t kick, I’m joking!” Minamoto Kiyomoto moved a little further away from her.

“‘There aren’t many honest people in this world, and I’m one of them,'” after saying this, Himemiya Izayoi laughed again, laughing so hard that the straw came out of her mouth, and the flame-like divine power on her body kept shaking.

The wind picked up. The gentle spring wind brushed past the chinquapin trees above and also gently caressed the corners of their clothes.

After finishing the yogurt, Kamibayashi Miko said to Minamoto Kiyomoto, “Even if you’ve learned the False Form curse and have a code name, there’s still a risk of exposing your true identity, for example, the curses you know.”

“Can that be changed too?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked.

“No,” Kamibayashi Miko turned her head to look at him. “So this is a risk. You yourself are at risk, and your mother in Shikoku is also at risk.”

Minamoto Kiyomoto fell silent.

The clouds that were as motionless as marble just now began to split with the previous gust of wind.

“You can also learn another curse,” Kamibayashi Miko looked into his eyes. “For an ordinary person, it takes several months to learn a minor curse. Your talent is very good, and it only takes a few hours to learn the greatest curses.”

“Mm,” Minamoto Kiyomoto nodded lightly, his eyes still reflecting the gloom of the clouds.

No matter how well he concealed it, as long as he participated in the “purge,” he would definitely leave clues, and his mother would definitely be in danger.

“Actually, you don’t have to worry too much,” Himemiya Izayoi suddenly said.

“You have a way?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked quickly.

“You’ll know if you go back and ask your mother.”

“My mother?”

Minamoto Kiyomoto had memories from birth. His mother had never shown any abnormalities. She was just an innkeeper who looked very elegant.

As for elegance, even an ordinary person could be very elegant.

He looked at Himemiya Izayoi. Himemiya Izayoi had a yogurt straw in her mouth, tilted her head, and looked back at him with a “hmm?” expression, as if she didn’t understand why he was looking at her.

This woman was very unusual.

She was friendly on the surface, but looked down on everyone in her heart. In her frivolity, there was a certain solemnity. Even when she was joking or acting coquettishly, she was intimidating.

She gave Minamoto Kiyomoto the feeling of being unfathomable, and he was certain that she was definitely a woman who was not moved by praise or humiliation.

It was precisely because she was such a noble woman that whenever she made charming and intimate gestures, the lethality was so great that even Minamoto Kiyomoto’s heart would race.

Some of the things she said were also very likely to be true.

But to ask his mother directly would only make her worry—even if she could help, it wouldn’t be more than Kamibayashi Miko, who was a Divine Miko.

He then thought of the father he had never seen since birth.

“Do you know about my mother?” Minamoto Kiyomoto asked Kamibayashi Miko.

“I don’t know,” Kamibayashi Miko shook her head lightly. “All I know about you is that you got the highest score in the country on the university entrance exam and haven’t had a girlfriend in twenty years.”

“No girlfriend in twenty years?” Himemiya Izayoi asked curiously.

“One’s vision must be long-term, one’s ambition must be great. It’s almost time for class, let’s go back,” Minamoto Kiyomoto couldn’t be bothered to ask anymore.

This miko from Ise Grand Shrine clearly didn’t want to say.

Compared to a miko, he thought she was more like a witch.

A miko was such a person, and then thinking about the Lord of Kyoto killing the Yagyu family, which had lasted for five hundred years, the impression of Kansai in his mind had gradually become demonized.

From this day on, Minamoto Kiyomoto began to prepare for participating in the “purge.”

Learning new curses, understanding the world of cultivators.

Many things were common sense for all cultivators, but he knew nothing about them.

One reason was that he had been in the “business” for a short time. The other was that in order to deal with the imminent Konohanasakuya-hime, Kamibayashi Miko had no time to teach him.

Now, besides going to Kamibayashi Miko’s place at night, he could also ask the “newly promoted university student” Himemiya Izayoi for advice during the day.

She was very generous with these things and just said them.

As for deeper topics, such as his mother, she would either change the subject or say, “I’ll tell you if you’re willing to go back to Kyoto with me.”

Knowing that there was danger, but at this point, Minamoto Kiyomoto had no choice but to move forward.

Even if he didn’t participate in the “purge” and only participated in the “subjugation” of yokai, these anti-human cultivators would still notice him—as the teammate of the Divine Miko.

Now, he could only cultivate desperately and believe that Himemiya Izayoi’s words were true.

Went to watch a table tennis match, so only 3000 words today. Just a day off.

(End of Chapter)